1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a keypad display method and apparatus of a portable device, and more particularly to a keypad display method and apparatus for displaying a partially expanded keypad of a portable device.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various types of portable devices are currently being developed (for example, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile phone, etc.) according to the developing capabilities of communication technology. In particular, various types of user interfaces, such as a keypad having hardware buttons and a keypad utilizing a touch screen, have been applied to portable devices.
In the latter case, a user inputs characters by touching a keypad displayed in a Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) window of a portable device (a so-called soft-button device) with his/her finger or a stylus pen. However, the user of the portable device has a high possibility of mistakenly touching adjacent buttons, due to the limited size of the screen and soft-buttons included in the keypad that are too small. In other words, it has a disadvantage of causing many character input errors in the case of a portable device that inputs characters through soft-buttons.
Additionally, the user has to use a backspace button or delete button to correct such errors, but further errors during the selection of these buttons may be induced, because the corresponding soft-buttons for the backspace button or delete button are also too small.